1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a recording and/or reproducing apparatus in which a tape is drawn out of a cassette and loaded on a predetermined path, and more particularly, to a tape loading operation where the end of the tape is detected at the time of loading.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventionally, in a VTR (Video Tape Recorder), a tape is drawn out of a cassette attached to the VTR and loaded on a predetermined path which has a rotating drum. In some VTRs, one of a pair of reel bases (with which a pair of reel bases are engaged) is fixed and the other reel base is not fixed so that the tape is drawn out of one reel side in the cassette at the time of the tape loading.
In such a configuration, when the end of the tape is detected at one of the reels in the course of loading, it is judged that the tape which can be drawn out of the cassette is run out. In this case, the tape loading is stopped or the tape is unloaded once, and fixing of one reel base is released to draw the tape out of the one reel side, thereby performing the loading again. According to such a loading method as described above, the loading time may be prolonged.
In some VTRs as described above, a moving chassis to which the cassette is attached is allowed to reciprocate with respect to a fixed chassis which has a rotating drum for the sake of reduction in size, and the moving chassis is moved forward in the direction of the rotating drum. Particularly, in some such VTRs, the moving chassis protrudes from an opening of an apparatus enclosure when the cassette is attached thereto and moved forward so as to be stored in the apparatus enclosure. Then, the enclosure cover (which opens and closes the opening in the apparatus enclosure) is closed by the user.
When such VTRs are used, however, the user often predicts the normal movement of the moving chassis and starts to close the enclosure cover immediately before the completion of forward movement of the moving chassis. In this case, according to the conventional configuration in which the tape loading operation is performed with the detection of the end of the tape as described above, the moving chassis stops or starts to move backward at the position where the end of the tape is detected immediately before the completion of forward movement of the moving chassis. Thus, the enclosure cover abuts against the moving chassis and the moving chassis is overloaded so that problems resulting in mechanism deformation and destruction may occur.